She was always one for celebrating key events in the UK in a noticeably grand fashion – and Queen Elizabeth II made sure to do so when the Olympic Games came to London 2012.
As loyal fans will remember, Her Royal Highness shared the screen with Daniel Craig as he returned to his legendary character James Bond for the now iconic Opening Ceremony.
During the five-minute skit, the fictional spay escorts the Queen from Buckingham Palace to the Olympic games in a private helicopter.
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To complete the sketch, a stunt double playing the monarch was seen jumping out of the aircraft fitted with a Union Jack parachute before Her Majesty made a dramatic appearance in the royal box.
But what many royalists may not know is that the Queen kept her cameo appearance in the Oscar-winning Danny Boyle skit a secret from her family until the scenes aired during the Opening Ceremony.
Earlier this year, production stage manager Sam Hunter told broadcaster Kirsty Wark how the late monarch surprised her family with her kept her involvement in the opening sketch.
He told viewers: “The Queen never told her family she was doing it. That was one of the stipulations when she agreed to be part of it.”
Looking back on the ceremony, it’s plain to see the surprise on her family members faces as they watched the moment for the first time with the rest of the world.
The original plans for the sketch didn’t include any lines for the monarch simply because the production team felt lucky to have the Queen’s involvement in the first place.
But it turned out that Her Royal Highness was more than interested in taking part, and even improvised her now memorable line in the video.
In an interview with BBC Breakfast, sketch writer Cottrell Boyce recalled: “[The Queen] put herself up for that, she was game – she wanted to be in that sketch.”
The Queen’s only line in the video, “Good evening, Mr Bond” came from the monarch herself after she told the director that she “should have a line.”
Cottrell added: “On the day that we were filming she said to Danny Boyle, ‘I think I should have a line’. So she bagged that line, there wasn’t a line in the script – she improv’d it.”
It comes after Her Majesty’s latest memorable skit hit out screens during her platinum jubilee celebrations just three months ago.
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Her Royal Highness shared the screen with none other than the beloved children’s fictional character Paddington Bear voiced by Ben Whishsaw.
Following the heartbreaking news of the monarch’s passing, the fictional bear’s official Twitter page paid a loving tribute to the monarch with a sweet call-back to the scene they shared together.
He penned: “Thank you Ma’am, for everything,” as fans gushed over the touching tribute online.
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